Mission: Southern Africa
Human Care Projects in Botswana
“Hello…my name is Chris!”
“My name is Chris!” With that simple greeting, my life would begin to take an all new twist in my understanding of mission work and the challenges of being a missionary
in a different culture. Chris is Pastor Christoph Weber, pastor and missionary to the Lutheran Church in Serowe, Botswana. Along with his wife Ziggy and their four children, Pastor Weber ministers to the congregation in Serowe and to a number of cattle post mission stations in the Kalahari Desert of Botswana. It is an extraordinary mission under difficult circumstances where the Good News of Jesus Christ is shared in such a wonderful way.
I visited Chris in March. After driving for almost nine hours from Pretoria, South Africa, we arrived in Serowe, Botswana and the home of Pastor Weber. We walked across the grass parking area, stepped onto the veranda, and then an accented voice boomed, “Hello…My name is Chris! Welcome to Botswana!”
Pastor Weber has been serving in Botswana for eight years. In that time has been led by the Lord to build the sanctuary in Serowe, the accompanying mission house for living quarters for the people he brings into town to attend the medical clinic, and establishing preaching stations at the outlying cattle posts. Pastor Weber makes regular visits to the cattle posts, most 210 kilometers from Serowe, for Word and Sacrament. He transports the people into town for medical treatment, teaching, and for food. The next day he makes the return journey out to the cattle post and on to the next one for a repeat of the previous day.
One highlight of the visit was the worship
service that Pastor Weber conducted in the village of Otse. There we met the village people and then gathered in an eight-foot diameter mud hut for worship and the celebration of the Sacrament. In the filtered light under the grass roof with thirteen adults, twenty children and the four of us from the mission team, we witnessed the power of the saving grace of Jesus Christ in the eating and drinking of the Savior’s very body and blood. In that simple dwelling, with many who were ill and dying of HIV/AIDs, we shared in the forgiveness of sins and the strengthening of our faith. We experienced a oneness that cannot be described with mere words. We were one people sharing in the one message and mission of the Christ.
I must confess that for one brief moment, I had hesitation as the chalice was being prepared. I knew that approximately one-third of the saints in that hut had a disease leading to death and that we were going to drink of that one cup. I asked myself, “Do I really believe what I have always taught that the Lord protects through His Supper and that no harm will befall me?” I remembered that the HIV/AIDs virus has not been proven to be transmitted through saliva and that it was only through blood transmission
that one contracted the disease. I offered a prayer of thanksgiving and mentally prepared to receive the blood and for Him to strengthen me in my faith. It was then, after my hesitation, that Pastor Weber communed the members of the mission team first, before the villagers, and before communing himself. I asked God’s forgiveness for my weakness of faith and for Him to strengthen me in my faith.
The Lord’s mission goes on each and every day in many small ways. God uses individuals like Chris and Ziggy Weber and their children and people like you and I to share His message of reconciliation with a dying world. We are called to be His ambassadors
of reconciliation and to tell others of what He has done and continues to do through His Church to bring all people to the saving knowledge of Christ.
Life changes can come in many ways. Through a Baptism, to be sure, through the preaching and teaching of His Word, and through frail, weak human beings like each of us. My life and focus in ministry was changed dramatically one Friday in Botswana and it all began with the words: “Hello…my name is Chris!”